There exists a growing consensus that in order to meet the
challenges of African agriculture (Fischer et al., 2009) such as climate
change (Schlenker and Lobell, 2010; Thorton et al., 2011), scientists
and policy makers will need to move away from prescriptive measures
based on predetermined hypotheses and research designs to more adaptive
ways of understanding problems and recommending probable solutions
(Herrick and Sarewitz, 2000) based on people's capabilities and
access to resources (Gurein, 2007; Hope, 2002). Ethnographic frameworks
and methods are one such adaptive tool researchers can use in parsing
out complex situations within the context of local practice and culture
(Bharwani, 2006; Berkes et al., 2000; Abel, 1998; Roncoli, 2006).

This paper highlights the use of the Livelihoods as Intimate
Government (LIG) approach and its application to agriculture in two
countries--Ghana and Malawi. The authors demonstrate how the LIG
approach is able to illuminate some of the most pressing needs that
affect the ability of agrarian communities to make a living without a
preconceived notion of what the challenge at hand is. Such preconceived
notions tend to lead to poorly diagnosed problems, which then result in
unsuitable recommendations and interventions.

Methods

Qualitative tools and methodologies commonly employed by programs
and projects provide a way to broadly evaluate local contexts and
aspects that define people's capabilities such as access to
resources, livelihood activities or power relationships. These
methodologies and tools have provided important insights into how social
cleavages such as gender, age and wealth impact the vulnerability,
adaptive capabilities and resilience of people within particular
contexts (Carr and Owusu-Daaku, 2015). Beyond this, however, there is a
lack of methodologies and tools, which can articulate the complex
interactions and relationships between social, economic and
environmental contexts and between various social cleavages. This is
where the LIG approach comes in. The LIG approach seeks to understand
decision-making in light of competing goals and interests as well as
particular individual and community framings of the world (Carr, 2013,
2014). These competing goals and framings form the basis of observed
livelihood strategies and outcomes. See Figure 1 for a graphical outline
of the LIG approach.

The Vulnerability Context portion of the LIG approach seeks to
establish what stressors are affecting livelihood activities or the
context within which decision-making occurs (Carr, 2014). In the
problematization stage of the LIG approach, the researcher identifies
competing claims of different groups of people about a specific issue
within the vulnerability context. The third phase of the methodology
explores three associated themes as an entry point into understanding
decision-making. These themes are discourses: the ways in which people
think and speak about or act in reference to a phenomenon; tools of
coercion: practices or technologies by which behavior is influenced, and
the mobilization of identity: the representations of self, constructed
by individuals and society, to which people ascribe or must conform to
that influence their discourses and tools of coercion. The final stage
of the LIG approach analyzes the reasons for which people make certain
decisions or take specific actions by linking outcomes to their
production through discourses, tools of coercion or mobilization of
identity.

The identification and understanding of the various roles and
responsibilities individuals have with regard to their livelihood
activities throughout the LIG approach is important for understanding
what actions they can take to respond to particular problems (Carr and
Owusu-Daaku, 2016; Onzere et al., 2015; Carr[ed], 2014; Carr et al.,
2015). The lenses through which these roles and responsibilities should
be identified and understood have to be contextual and not assessed on a
priori basis (Carr and Owusu-Daaku, 2016; Onzere et al., 2015; Carr[ed],
2014; Carr et al., 2015). This is where the Livelihoods as Intimate
Government (LIG) approach (Carr, 2013; Carr, 2014) proves most useful.
LIG enables the identification of who does what particular activities
and around what social cleavages or groupings people with these various
responsibilities fall (Carr, 2014).

Objectives

This paper demonstrates the adaptability of the LIG approach as an
interpretive framework and field methodology for agricultural research
by illustrating the application of the approach in two different
contexts in two countries. The Ghana case study employs the first two
stages of the LIG approach in-depth - understanding the vulnerability
context and identifying the problematization (see Figure 1)--and the
following stages at a more surface level in research on the use of sea
defense systems as an adaptation to coastal erosion and flooding
(attributable to climate change) in river delta communities where there
are large numbers of farmers and even larger numbers of fisherfolk (both
men and women involved in the fishing industry). The Malawi case
utilizes the LIG approach in designing and collecting data for a gender
analysis within the context of an ongoing climate change project. The
Malawi case study focuses on only the vulnerability context to achieve
its goals for the gender analysis. These two very different case studies
demonstrate that one does not have to employ all the stages of the LIG
approach in order for the methodology to have utility.

Description of Research Methods

Each application of the LIG approach involved extensive desk
studies which included literature reviews and content analysis of
relevant information sources, semi-structured interviews and focus
groups, and site and participant observations.

The information presented and discussed in the Ghana case study, is
from a sample of 52 residents in communities of the Keta Municipality of
the Volta River Delta (VRD) (48 % who are male and 52% who are female)
and a sample of 7 government officials (5 municipal level and 2 national
level). Since the overall purpose of the study was to evaluate sea
defense systems as an adaptation to climate change in river deltas from
the perspective of various actors, selecting the study areas was
relatively straightforward. The two areas in the VRD with such coastal
infrastructure are the Keta municipality and the Ada East district, so
these two districts emerged as the geographical areas for the study.
This paper discusses only information from the Keta municipality at the
community and municipal government levels. The major livelihood
divisions of the community residents are fishing-related activities such
as fishermen and fish mongers (women who smoke and sell the fish),
farming-related activities which include mangrove harvesting, trading
activities described as those who do petty trading and do not primarily
engage in the sale of fish or farm produce and service providing
activities such as hairdressers and an electrician. Some respondents
stated more than one livelihood and so could be categorized in more than
one division but it was the livelihood they declared as their major
livelihood that the authors used to determine which category to place
them under. See Figure 2 for the proportions of each livelihood
division.

The information presented and discussed from the Malawi case study
is with interviews from eighty respondents within Kwilasya, a community
living adjacent to Liwonde Forest Reserve. The forest reserve located in
Machinga district in southern Malawi, is part of the extensive Miombo
woodlands, which extend across central and southern Africa and cover
significant land areas in Angola, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Malawi, Mozambique,
Tanzania, and southern Democratic Republic of Congo. In Malawi, Miombo
woodlands are important for agricultural based livelihoods since they
are water catchment areas and provide an important source of wild fruit
and mushrooms for surrounding agricultural communities. A major
challenge, however, is that these woodlands have become highly degraded
and have been completely lost in some areas with land clearing for
agriculture as one of the major drivers of this degradation.
Understanding the vulnerability context of the agrarian communities
surrounding these woodlands is critical in designing context-suited
interventions in order to reverse and slow down degradation.

Of the respondents interviewed in Malawi, the majority were Yao by
ethnicity, followed by Lomwe. Table 1 shows the ethnicity of respondents
in more detail. Out of a total of 80 respondents, 50 were women and 30
were men. About 21% of the respondents had no education at all, while
36% of respondents had some primary school education, 13% finished
primary school, and 6% of respondents had attended secondary school.
With regard to marital status, 61% of respondents were monogamous, 25%
were in polygamous marriages while about 8% of respondents were
divorced.

Summary of Findings and Recommendations

The Vulnerability Context

Climate Change in the Volta River Delta of Ghana

For the Ghana case study, the vulnerability context is the issue of
climate change in the Volta River Delta (VRD) of Ghana. A significant
number of studies characterize coastal erosion as the most significant
problem affecting the VRD (Addo et al., 2011; Boateng, 2009, 2010, 2012;
Bollen et al., 2010; DARA and CVF, 2012; Kusimi and Dika, 2012; Nyamedor
and Codjoe, 2013). Although coastal erosion is a natural process, it is
expected to be exacerbated by sea-level rise (SLR) and increased
frequency and severity of storms as a result of climate change (Wong et
al. 2014). Many studies attribute the increasing rate of erosion in the
VRD to the construction of the Akosombo dam, which was completed in 1961
(Anthony and Blivi, 1999; Addo et al., 2011; Boateng, 2009, 2010, 2012;
Boateng et al., 2012, Bollen et al., 2010, Gyau-Boakye, 2001). These
studies indicate that the damming of the Volta River reduced the amount
of sediment carried down into the delta making the region more
susceptible to the action of sea waves. In the VRD, coastal erosion
destroys homes, reduces coastal lands and their attendant biodiversity,
and causes unemployment for those whose farmlands are affected (Kusimi
and Dika, 2012). These changes are happening at different rates in
different parts of the VRD specifically in the Keta Municipality, where
two sea defense systems have been constructed. The Keta Municipality is
located in the south-eastern part of Ghana along the coast, east of the
Volta River estuary. According to Ghana's 2010 Population and
Housing Census, Keta's total population was about 147, 618 with
53.5% being female and 46.5% being male (Keta Municipal Assembly, 2013).

For the Keta Township, the average estimated rate of coastal
erosion after the seawall's construction is 2 m/year with highs of
4 m/year (Addo et al., 2011). Before the construction of the wall, the
average annual rate of coastal erosion was estimated to range from 2-8
m/year (Nairn et al., 1998). The predominant livelihoods of the
municipality are fishing, crop and vegetable farming, and livestock
rearing (Keta Municipal Assembly, 2013). Human activities in deltas need
to be studied in more detail to effectively increase the resilience of
deltas and their populations to future changes (Ericson et al., 2006).
One such human activity is the construction of sea defense systems to
deal with the phenomenon of coastal erosion.

The likely biophysical impacts of climate change on deltas such as
coastal erosion have received significant attention. However, relatively
little attention has been paid to the ways in which the different
stakeholders of deltaic environments frame the vulnerability of
residents of deltas to climate change. Such framings are important for
three reasons. First, the ways in which residents of deltas frame their
own vulnerability is critical to understanding the likely future
adaptation pathways these populations will follow to manage the worst
impacts of climate change on their lives. Climate change adaptation
pathways refer to decision-making options with regard to which actions
will be taken to adapt to the impacts of climate change (Wise et al.,
2014). Second, how policymakers and others view the vulnerability of
these residents is important for understanding if these actors are
creating policies and planning for a future that aligns with one
envisioned by delta residents. Third, there is the potential for the
perceptions and actions of delta residents and policy makers and/or
others to be unaligned, which could either exacerbate the existing CCV
of these residents or result in new segments of the population becoming
vulnerable to the impacts of climate change.

The third reason of misalignment has already been expressed in the
form of sea defense systems in the Volta River Delta (VRD) of Ghana.
Between 2001 and 2004, the Government of Ghana (GoG) implemented the
construction of a sea defense system in the Keta area of the VRD
consisting of a 9km road, flood control and sea defense structures and
land reclamation (Angnuureng et al., 2013; Boateng., 2009; Cotsapas,
personal communication) officially known as the Keta Sea Defense System
(KSDS). Later on, between 2008 and 2014, the GoG implemented the
construction of a 2.7 km-defense system, in addition to the
rehabilitation of a road destroyed by erosion (Andoh, 2014; Blagogee,
2014) between Srogbe and Kplortorkor in the Keta municipality. This
second development is referred to in this paper as the Atorkor Sea
Defense System (ASDS). Research reveals that the Keta sea defense system
is creating greater erosion downshore, east of the system (Angnuureng et
al., 2013; Addo et al., 2011; Boateng, 2009).

Malawi: Livelihood Stressors through a Gender Lens in the Midst of
Climate Change Programming

For the Malawi case study, the issue was the need to understand the
gendered vulnerability contexts of agrarian and forest-based
livelihoods, of those living adjacent to Liwonde Forest Reserve and
consequently how the vulnerability context has an impact on trade-offs
between prevention of forest degradation and maximization of livelihood
opportunities. As earlier stated, the Malawi case study presented does
not touch on discourses or tool of coercion as articulated later for the
Ghana case study. Instead the data presented for Malawi, show the
varying ways in which men and women see themselves as vulnerable to
different stressors. This case study, therefore, focuses attention on
the ability of LIG approach to carefully illuminate nuanced
vulnerabilities within particular contexts.

Figure 3 shows the livelihood stressors, in declining order of
frequency of mention as identified by residents of Kwilasya. Financial
problems were most commonly cited with 62.5% respondents mentioning
poverty, not having enough income or being cash poor as a major
livelihood concern inhibiting the ability to meet day-to-day household
basic needs. Financial problems were attributed to the lack of a regular
source of income as well as not having crop surpluses for sale. Fifty
four percent of those who identified financial problems as a major
livelihood stressor reported having problems acquiring food, household
utensils, clothes, salt, sugar, soap as well as difficulties paying for
school fees, making house repairs and needed farm labor. Forest
activities including logging and charcoal burning present some of the
few opportunities available to acquire and income.

The second most commonly mentioned livelihood stressor (42.5% of
respondents) was the inability to feed the household through to the next
harvest season. This exacerbated the need for households to have cash
purchase food during the hungry season. 16.25 % of respondents mentioned
changing weather patterns as a primary livelihood concern. This included
changes in the dry and rainy seasons of the growing season. Thirty
percent of respondents indicated health is a major concern. Sickness of
the farmer herself or himself, which reduced the ability to work and
make a livelihood, was the most frequently discussed problem under
health issues. Lack of access to adequate health care facilities because
the nearest reliable health facility is more than six kilometers away in
Liwonde town was also seen as a significant health related challenge.
Other frequently mentioned livelihood concerns included lack of
business/lack of demand for business services provided (21% of
respondents), problems acquiring fertilizer and other inputs (20%),
gendered barriers to livelihoods (16%), problems with ganyu (day labor)
(14%), having unpredictable livelihood sources (14%) and divorce or
complicated marriages (13%).

The lower ranking of changing weather conditions as a major
livelihood concern (16.25%) buttresses the argument being made in this
paper that a problem or challenge should not be assessed a priori. Under
research in the context of a climate change program, changing weather
conditions (attributable to climate change) was not the main livelihood
stressor of respondents.

When the most mentioned livelihood concerns are segregated by
gender (and other social cleavages such as age), some interesting
similarities and differences can be seen. Figure 4 shows those
livelihood concerns reported by both male and female respondents. For
both men and women financial hardship and food insecurity remained the
most important livelihood concern, followed by food insecurity. For 67%
(20) of men and 60% (30) of women financial hardship was a major
concern.

In the sample, 40% (12) of men and 44% (22) of women reported being
food insecure. Health problems were also a concern for both men and
women with 30% (9) men and 30% (15) women reporting illness as a major
impediment to making a livelihood. While both female and male
respondents were concerned with personal illness, young women also
expressed concern about the impact of their children's illness on
their ability to carry out livelihood activities since they are the
primary caretakers for sick children. A slightly higher percentage of
men, 27% (8) were concerned about the lack of business opportunities
within the community than women 26% (13). A slightly larger percentage
of women (18%) reported changing weather patterns compared to men at
(13%).

Around 17% of men and 12% women were concerned with problems with
ganyu. These problems included the lack of ganyu opportunities in the
area, less pay compared to the amount of work completed, failure to get
paid for work already done, and the fact that ganyu is an undesirable
social activity. A young female respondent explained the social
undesirability of ganyu when asked what she liked about her livelihood
activities. "I don't think there is anyone who can say that I
am happy or proud to be doing ganyu. I just do it because I am lacking
some basic needs (Kwilasya # 1). Ganyu, however is a source of
"fast money" (Kwilasya # 75) and is sought when there is a
need to supplement other livelihood activities. Another female
respondent explained why she does ganyu in this way. "I don't
really like it but I do it when I have problems just to make sure that I
can be able to support my family throughout the year" (Kwilasya #
53).

Four percent (7) of women complained about the unpredictability of
livelihood resources, compared to 13% of men. Interestingly, many of
these respondents had multiple livelihood strategies. For example, the
breakdown of women in this group shows that two women practiced rain fed
agriculture and sold agricultural produce, two were farming and doing
ganyu, one woman was farming, selling agricultural produce and selling
mandasi (1), one was practicing both rain fed farming and dambo (2) land
agriculture, and another was practicing both rain fed farming and
irrigated farming.

A significant difference was found in concerns about acquiring
enough fertilizer for household farming. Forty seven percent of men
(14), were concerned about having access to sufficient inputs,
particularly fertilizer, while only 12% (6) women reported the same
concern. Most respondents rely on subsidy coupons from the government to
purchase fertilizer. These coupons, however, require two households to
share one bag of fertilizer (3) and as a result respondent often
complained of having very little fertilizer to meet their needs.
Although the number of female respondents reporting fertilizer concerns
is rather small, an interesting aspect is that all except one of the
women were in polygamous marriages or divorced. More information is
needed on whether polygamous marriage or divorce has an impact on
women's access to inputs and in what way.

Several gender-specific vulnerabilities, that is concerns only
mentioned by men and those only mentioned by women, were reported. For
women, gendered barriers to livelihoods were the fourth most mentioned
livelihood vulnerability with 16% of women indicating that being a woman
is a major contributor to the challenges they faced. Various reasons
were provided for this challenge. Married women have limited control of
their ability to temporarily migrate outside the village in search of
employment or business opportunities--a strategy that was available to
and often employed by men. Young migrant women also reported problems
with social isolation.

These women lacked the same social support system they would have
had while living in their home villages. This made farming and other
daily activities more difficult since non-migrant women rely heavily on
family members, in particular female relatives including sisters,
cousins and friends to assist in farming, domestic work, and childcare
responsibilities. One woman discussed exposure to illnesses as an
important vulnerability associated with being a woman. The elderly woman
explained that she had significant difficulty in managing her day-to-day
activities due to complications associated with HIV/AIDS: "I feel
like because I am a woman I was exposed to the disease because of my
husband. If I had the power to make decisions, I would not have been
exposed to the disease" (Kwilasya # 70). Divorce/complicated
marriages was a concern mentioned by 12% of women. This included
divorced women, women in polygamous marriages, and women whose husbands
have migrated to South Africa, but are not sending money back home. The
main concern was difficulty meeting household needs given limited or
non-existent assistance from men.

Four male respondents indicated that having too many people to
support was an important contributor to their vulnerability context. Two
male respondents expressed concerns that there were no employment
opportunities within the country. That is even though men have the
ability to migrate to search for better paying work, this work is often
scarce within the country. One male respondent explained how this was
problematic for earning a living. "I feel like everywhere I can go
I can't be employed so the main reason is that Malawi is poor"
(Kwilasya # 21). For two young male respondents limited decision-making
was indicated as a problem since the in-laws control major farming
assets (land, dambo land). This also points to a possible second
manifestation of age and gender for men with younger men having limited
decision-making power over household reproductive resources.

Problematization

In the problematization stage of the LIG approach, the researcher
identifies competing claims of different groups of people about a
specific issue within the vulnerability context. The problematization is
both the object/idea around which the definition of a problem to be
solved is formed, and challenges to the order of things around which
that definition emerge (Bacchi, 2012). Problematizations emerge around
disagreements in a targeted livelihood group around how and why members
of a group live the way they do - these disagreements are then
identified as a challenge to be solved

Ghana: Sea Defense Systems as an Adaptation to Climate Change

In this research, the differing claims are those of community
residents versus government officials on the benefits or otherwise of
sea defense systems as an adaptation to the climate change impacts of
coastal erosion and flooding.

Claims from Community Residents on Sea Defense Systems

The community residents were interviewed with regard to their
thoughts on the two sea defense systems in the Municipality: the Keta
Sea Defense System (KSDS) and the Atorkor Sea Defense System (ASDS).
Forty-eight (48) percent of interviewees expressed their thoughts about
the KSDS (based on where they were located) while 52% made claims about
the ASDS (for the same reason as the KSDS). Their thoughts were
summarized under the following categories: Positive (respondents
generally thought the sea defense was good and had helped curbed the
problem of coastal erosion and flooding), Negative (that the sea defense
was not helpful and was causing more problems such as erosion in some
instances), Mixed (both Positive and Negative claims) and Ambivalent.
See Figure 5 for a summary of the distribution of these thoughts and
Figure 6 for the distribution of these thoughts by the sea defense
system in question.

Figure 5 shows that 50% of respondents had positive thoughts about
the sea defense system. However, this same figure illustrates that as
many as 38% had mixed thoughts on the sea defense systems, with the
remaining 12% distributed among ambivalent (6%), negative (4%) and no
response (2%). As many as half of respondents not thinking sea defense
systems is an entirely positive adaptation to climate change begs
further investigation. Figure 6 showing the distribution of these
thoughts by either the KSDS or ASDS also reveals some interesting
findings. According to Figure 6, the ASDS has more positive responses
than the KSDS; less negative responses (in fact zero negative responses)
than the KSDS; less mixed responses than the KSDS and less ambivalent
responses than the KSDS. The overall more positive view on the ASDS can
be attributed to the fact that the ASDS was completed much more recently
(2015) than the KSDS (2004) and so some of the negative views on sea
defense systems such as causing further erosion would take a longer time
frame to manifest.

Claims of Municipality Officials on Sea Defense Systems

Five municipality officials were interviewed about their thoughts
on the sea defense systems. The analysis focused on the district as the
level of governmental focus because the District Assembly (DA) is
considered the foundation of local governance in Ghana (ILGS and FES,
2010). The departments of the interviewed officials are as follows:
economic planning, natural resources management, engineering, disaster
management, and information. Table 2 provides a summary of their
thoughts on the sea defense systems.

Contrary to popular research which demonstrates that government
views are often different from that of local residents (Muller-Mahn and
Everts, 2013), Table 2 illustrates that the views of the municipality
officers interviewed are in line with the 38% of residents (mixed
thoughts on the sea defense systems). In fact, speaking by majority
numbers alone, we could argue that a majority of community residents
view the sea defense systems as positive while a majority of
municipality officials have mixed views on the projects. This difference
in majority views is most likely a function of proximity to the
intervention (i.e. the sea defense system) but it is interesting to note
that the reverse of the expected outcome (more government officials
would view a government implemented project as positive, than community
residents) is what the data and analysis so far illustrate. This
preliminary finding requires more research and analysis to be more
conclusive. The mixed views of the municipality officials arise mainly
from their knowledge of the project implementation process and how they
generally felt sidelined by the national government in the planning and
implementation of all associated activities with the sea defense system.
The one ambivalent response was from the officer who stated he had
received no contact whatsoever from any government official (either at
the municipal or national level) or consultant with regard to the sea
defense project.

Claims of National Government Officials on Sea Defense Systems

Two government officials were interviewed at the national level on
their thoughts on sea defense systems as an adaptation to climate
change. One official's work was related to project impact
assessment and the other's work involved climate change related
issues. Both these national level officials had positive views on sea
defense systems as adaptations to climate change. These officials'
overall positive view, as opposed to the municipal officials'
generally mixed ones, could be due to the national level officials'
both physical and administrative distance from these
projects-particularly the fact that they do not have to deal with
community residents, over half of whom, according to the information in
Figure 5, do not have entirely positive views about sea defense systems.
For these officials a problem was identified i.e. coastal erosion and
flooding and the problem has been solved by the construction of a sea
defense system.

To conclude this session, sea defense systems as a problematization
reveals that half of the community residents interviewed have positive
views on the system while half do not have entirely positive views; the
municipality officials have overall mixed views and the national level
officials have positive views. Sea defense systems as an adaptation to
climate change clearly mean different things to different people.

Discourses, Tools of Coercion and the Mobilization of Identity

According to the LIG approach, this phase of the methodology
explores three associated themes as an entry point into understanding
decision-making. These themes are discourses: the ways in which people
think and speak about or act in reference to a phenomenon; tools of
coercion: practices or technologies by which behavior is influenced, and
the mobilization of identity: the representations of self, constructed
by individuals and society, to which people ascribe or must conform to
that influence their discourses and tools of coercion.

Ghana: Livelihoods, Climate Change and Resettlement

The information for the Ghana case study presented in this paper
does not touch on the mobilization identity but analyzes the discourses
of community residents, municipality and national officials and
discusses one tool of coercion by way of a resident resettlement program
for the KSDS.

Discourses of Community Residents

The discourses of community residents were garnered by asking them
what their biggest challenge in making a living for themselves was. A
variety of responses were received and summarized as follows:
climate-related challenges such as flooding and coastal erosion;
livelihood-related challenges--challenges that did not have a direct
linkage to climate but impacted the respondent's ability to make a
living such as competition from fishing trawlers and fluctuating prices
of fish on the market; and living-situation related-which had to do with
issues that were not directly linked to the climate but had more to do
with the particular place in which the respondent was living such as
irregular municipal water supply or bad roads. Many respondents
described challenges that fell under more than one of these categories.
However, the first challenge that respondents mentioned was taken as the
one that was foremost on their minds. Based on this assumption, the
categories of climate first, livelihood first and living situation first
were created to reflect the discourse that was more important to the
respondent.

Figure 7 indicates that 60% of community residents had a livelihood
first discourse with regard to their greatest challenge in making a
living or their vulnerability context. Thus, it is not so surprising
that about 50% of community residents did not have an entirely positive
view on the sea defense systems and that about 38% of these views were a
mixture of both positive and negative views. "Climate first"
challenges fall in second at 29% while "living situation
first" challenges come in last at 12%. This information is in line
with research that demonstrates that the climate is often not the most
important stressor in the lives of people who live in environments which
the rest of the world considers climate-stressed (Nyantakyi-Frimpong and
Bezner-Kerr, 2015) and in line with the findings of the Malawi case
study with regard to changing weather patterns under the vulnerability
context.

Discourses of Municipal and National Officials

The discourses of government officials that their views on sea
defense systems as an adaptation to climate change can be traced to stem
largely from their roles or job descriptions. This linkage results from
the capacity in which these officials granted the interviewer an
interview. These officials were speaking to the interviewer as
representatives of the state and so the knowledge and ideas they alluded
to were based on their positionality to the interviewer who was a
non-government official. A summary of their discourses is seen in Table
3.

Most of the discourses in Table 3 with regard to the government
officials' roles seem self-explanatory. Two probably non-intuitive
ones explained a bit further are those of the economic planning officer
and the information officer whose discourses were mainly one of climate
change as opposed to economic development of information service
provision needs respectively. The officers were aware that the larger
project the interviewer's research was related to had to do with
climate change vulnerability and adaptation, hence the discourses they
harped on, which probably influenced their views on the sea defense
system, were of climate change. The interviewer's positionality to
them and vice versa played a role in determining which discourse with
regard to their job description they tapped into.

Tool of Coercion: the KSDS Community Resettlement Program

Some communities had to be resettled as a result of the
construction of the KSDS. This resettlement involved the construction of
homes on reclaimed land as part of the KSDS project, into which
community residents moved once the homes were complete. While analysis
of the information on the community residents' views and
experiences is on-going, a preliminary high-level summary indicates that
residents' perspectives on the resettlement program vary. Some
residents are satisfied with the new homes they have received, while
many others are not, citing poor workmanship, deteriorating structures
and inadequate facilities (some homes were alleged to not be connected
to a septic tank even though the home possessed a water closet
facility). Many residents also wished they could have stayed in their
former locations and not had to move despite the fact that they were
being affected by the sea. Adequate information is currently unavailable
to ascertain the degree to which an attachment to place overrides the
impact of a climate-hazard resulting in a desire to "adapt in
place" and not have to move but it is clear that place attachment
plays a role in this complex situation. The community residents by way
of the resettlement program were managed or "policed" as it
were. Their ability to move and where they went were all conditioned by
an entity outside of them i.e. the national government with support from
the municipal government.

The National Disaster Management Organization (NADMO) unit in the
Municipal Assembly oversaw the resettlement process. Allocation of homes
however was directly managed by a local committee. Recipients of houses
had pre-registered with the committee and municipal assembly before
construction of the homes had begun.

At the municipal level, there were complaints from some municipal
officials about how the national government implemented the construction
process with non-locally sourced contractors (One of these officials
mentioned these contractors as coming from Accra-the capital of the
country). The municipal assembly officers complained about how they
could not monitor the work of these contractors as they had no legal
agreements with them and the contractors did not live within the
municipality. This inability of local sourcing and oversight resulted in
some shoddily built or unfinished houses. Presently there is no
information on the resettlement program from national government
officials but hopefully such views will be incorporated in subsequent
analyses in order to make the assessment of the resettlement program
more holistic.

Outcomes

This final stage of the LIG approach analyzes the reasons for which
people make certain decisions or take specific actions. It links
outcomes such as project implementation dissatisfaction to their
production through discourses of climate change, or livelihood security
and tools of coercion such as a community resettlement program in the
case of Ghana. In the case of Malawi, the LIG approach suggests an
outcome of a more intersectional understanding of gender by way of a
mobilization of people's identity.

Ghana: Uneven Landscapes of Climate Change Adaptation

The outcomes the sea defense system as an adaptation to climate
change produce are highly uneven. The process produces a mixture of
views on the benefits of the sea defense system where only half of the
community level sample sees the adaptation as entirely positive. The
other half constitutes a mixture of positive, negative and ambivalent
views. The views of community residents on their greatest challenges are
more focused on things that directly affect their livelihoods and that
are not necessarily linked to the climate. Also, municipal officials who
represent the government at the local level are not altogether pro sea
defense projects as climate change adaptation. On the other hand,
national level officials have wholly positive views on sea defense
systems. The reasons for these varying and seeming contradictory views
will need analysis beyond the preliminary assessment provided here in
order to provide answers beyond those that have already been outlined in
this paper.

Malawi: Intersectionality Advances the Identification and
Understanding of Vulnerability Concerns

The Malawi case study confirms that operationalizations of gender
are indeed intersectional and a matter of process rather than rigid
identity and that understandings of gender as illuminated by the LIG
approach affect people's vulnerability and ability to adapt to
specific stressors in their lives (Onzere et al., 2015).

Recommendations

The two case studies clearly demonstrate that
one-size-fits-all-solutions are inappropriate for the future of African
agriculture especially in the context of climate change and conservation
related issues as the LIG approach had to be tweaked in each context to
fit the specificities of the situation under investigation.

In the Ghana case study, the LIG approach has proven a useful lens
with which to view sea defense systems as an adaptation to climate
change. From this initial assessment, these projects are producing
uneven outcomes and the views of stakeholders on their benefits are
expectedly varied with some surprising results at the municipal level
where government officials have a more nuanced view on the benefits or
otherwise of sea defense systems. Further analysis is needed to
determine some possible reasons for these varying views, especially with
regard to the mobilization of identity component of the LIG approach in
order to understand what aspects of people's identity influences
their perceptions and how these perceptions interact with wider social
forces in the complex project of climate change adaptation.

For the Malawi case study, it is evident that intersectional
understandings of gender beyond the male and female binary provide a
better understanding into vulnerability concerns so that these concerns
can be addressed adequately. A separate analysis into discourses and
tools of coercion from the overall Malawi case study would provide an in
depth understanding of how exactly residents of Kwilasya navigate the
tensions between sustainable forest use and the maximization of
livelihood opportunities.

The overall recommendations from the findings presented in this
chapter are that ethnographic frameworks and methods such as the LIG
approach should be employed in agricultural research in order to better
understand complex problems and to facilitate the development of more
appropriate solutions that are not ultimately maladaptive.

The application of ethnographic frameworks and methods such as the
LIG approach in agricultural research supports programs and projects
that advance food security by ensuring that these programs operate
within contextually relevant parameters with regard to the threat to
food security being addressed--whether that threat be climate change or
environmental degradation. Operating within parameters that are
context-specific promote the sustainability of policies and programs
that advance food security and ensure that limited funds in an era of
increasing need are appropriately used.

Hoppe R. (2002) Rethinking the puzzles of the science-policy nexus:
Boundary traffic, boundary work and the mutual transgression between STS
and Policy Studies. Paper presented for the EASST 2002 Conference,
"Responsibility under Uncertainty', York, July 31-August 3.